The old dog's bag of new tricks

Date: October 5 2012

Jenny Cooney Carrillo

Liam Neeson says he'd be surprised if his new action thriller, Taken 2, led to another sequel.

''She [his onscreen daughter] can't get taken again, that would be bad parenting with a capital B,'' the Irish actor says as he rolls his eyes and then laughs at the suggestion. ''But maybe if there was another one, they could just come to me for advice after someone else's kid is taken hostage!''

In Taken 2, Neeson returns as Bryan Mills, a retired CIA agent who stopped at nothing to save his abducted daughter in the 2009 hit Taken.

In this film, he and his former wife, Lenore (Famke Janssen), are taken in Istanbul and his daughter, Kim (Maggie Grace), must follow his advice to set them free before she's also captured and they're all executed.

''I've had quite a few people come up to me and say, 'My daughter is never going anywhere near Europe,' after the first film came out and I know they were trying to be complimentary but it always hurts me to hear it,'' Neeson says as he sits in a New York hotel.

''I'm a UNICEF ambassador and a few years ago I got these shocking figures that only 14 per cent of Americans have passports and only 11 per cent actually use them, so I hope I didn't just make it worse!''

Growing up in Northern Ireland, Neeson became a boxing champion and college drop-out before joining a local theatre company. His breakthrough was the 1993 Steven Spielberg drama Schindler's List, which earned him an Oscar nomination, and he achieved cult status in 1999 as Jedi master Qui-Gon Jinn in the prequel Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace.

Neeson appeared in a string of award-winning dramas, including Michael Collins (1996), Gangs of New York (2002) and Kinsey (2004) before Taken reinvented him as an action star.

''Around the time the first [Taken] film came out, the financial crisis hit and people felt really shafted by a lot of figures of authority,'' he theorises of that film's surprise success. ''The ones who went to see the film saw someone who was going to take charge himself and not go to the authorities to help him, and I think it really struck a chord.

''Hollywood loves pigeonholing everybody, so after that I seemed to get re-pigeonholed and was sent quite a few action scripts: some I did (The Dark Knight Rises, Clash of the Titans and Unknown) and some I'd have to say to them, 'Guys, I'm 60 f---ing years old!'''

Neeson's age comes up more than once. His co-star in both Taken films, Dutch actor Janssen - best known as a Bond girl in the 1995 film GoldenEye - marvels: ''I think it's fantastic that in Hollywood you can become an action star at 60.

''Liam's setting the bar high now. I think he's been extremely clever with how he's presented himself in Hollywood and how he's managed his career as well as he has for so long.''

The gently spoken actor shrugs when asked about the milestone and what he did to celebrate earlier this year. ''Sixty is the new 40, that's what they tell me, right?'' he muses. ''And I am going to name-drop and say my pal Bono was there at a restaurant for my birthday, with about 15 friends and, of course, lots of bottles of Perrier water!'' he adds ironically.

Tragically, the same year that Taken changed his career, the death of his wife, Natasha Richardson, in a freak ski accident in Canada changed his life, forcing him to become a single parent to their sons Michael and Daniel, now 16 and 17. It's another reason the film's theme of going to any lengths to protect your family resonates with him.

''Looking out for your children is an ongoing process throughout your life,'' Neeson says.

''It seems like last Tuesday, walking them across the road was a major event and then letting them cross the road alone was a serious major event and now my boys are learning to drive so it's something every parent goes through.

''I remember when my first boy was born. Meryl Streep - who's a pal - saw my son sleeping and said, 'You're a hostage for the rest of your life,' and it's absolutely true.''